


Jumpstart My Heart

by calrissian18



Series: Mating Games: Round 2 [7]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Memory Alteration, Post Nogitsune, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-08
Updated: 2014-06-08
Packaged: 2018-02-03 21:42:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1757725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calrissian18/pseuds/calrissian18
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There’s no way to hide it now, Stiles is too curious, too sure there’s something to be curious about.  Derek says bluntly, “You died in Gerard’s basement.”</p><p>Written for mating_games Challenge 4: Light vs. Dark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jumpstart My Heart

**Author's Note:**

> I picked dark! Who's surprised?

She’d come to Derek first but he couldn’t appease her.   _Wouldn’t_.

* * *

Stiles smells like flop sweat and confusion.  Derek watches his gaze flick between Morrell’s darkly amused face and the mountain ash encircling her.

Smile becomes smirk.  “What do you think, Stiles?” she asks in that saccharine-sweet voice of hers, lips pursing.  Her eyes dart up, ringing white and Derek knows those eyes.   _Hates_  those eyes.  “Permanent darkness?  An eternal eclipse?  You know what it does to werewolves but did you know it affects all magic?  Renders it inert.”

She’s going to ruin everything Derek’s worked so hard to protect.  And he can’t stand by and watch it happen.  He slinks out of the shadows.

“Get away from him.”  The words stick, lodging in his throat.

Gone is seduction and in its place is fury.  “You’ve unbalanced an entire town.”

Derek doesn’t care.  He eyes the circle, flexes his claws.  “I will kill you,” he promises.

“I know exactly what you’re capable of, Derek Hale.”  Her eyes flash, voice drops.  “He’s an abomination.”

Derek flinches, remembers Stiles’ lips forming the word long before—before—

“Derek?”  It’s a broken exhalation, the voice of someone who already knows something’s wrong.

“Tell him,” she spits.

He won’t.

Her face contorts and she turns to Stiles herself.  “No town is this unlucky.  Deep down, you know it.”  Derek can see tumblers clicking into place, doesn’t know how to stop it happening.  “So many who died young, so much life stolen.”  She’s almost whispering now.  “Those who aren’t meant to have it always run through it more quickly.”  To Derek, she says, “Tell him or I  _show_  him.”

Derek  _can't_  and she moves the moon.

Stiles’ heartbeat doesn’t so much as stutter.  The world goes dark and so does he.  He collapses, heavy, consciousness snuffed out.  Silent, still.

Dead.

Something in Derek breaks seeing it again and he can’t help the mournful howl that erupts from him.  He’s half-shifted, half-wild.  He slams into the barrier of mountain ash—too elemental to be broken—snarls around fangs, “Undo it.”

She only smirks.  “You’re not sure how long is too long, are you?  How dead is too dead for the spell to keep him going?”

Derek rages, her eyes go white and light spills back in.

Stiles’ heart beats and Derek sinks to his knees in a bone deep relief.  There’s no way to hide it now, Stiles is too curious, too sure there’s something to be curious about.  Derek says bluntly, “You died in Gerard’s basement.”

Stiles’ whole body jerks.

Derek swallows, he can’t stop now he’s started.  “Once he finished wiring up Erica and Boyd, he did the same to you.  I found you, my family had—there was a spell—you weren’t supposed to  _die_.”  The words tumble together, Stiles’ blank eyes on cold cement at the forefront of his mind.  “When Boyd died, I knew.”  He’d watched them all follow—ending in Allison.  Their stolen life feeding Stiles’.

“Death’s been trying to correct the imbalance,” Morrell says, almost gently, from behind them.

Fuck. This, too, then. Derek grits his teeth, eyes wet, and says, “It was a surge of electricity,  _again_.” That damn aluminum bat. “The spell wouldn’t have worked twice.” His breath catches, voice shaking, and he can’t look at Stiles. “The nogitsune was  _right there_.”

“Oh my God,” Stiles breathes, shattered.

He knows now, what Derek’s done, what he knowingly handed him over to. The nogitsune was the only way to fix what was broken. It had been worth it. Worth  _anything_.

“This is—You have to let me go. Derek, this isn’t my life.” He’s staring down at his own hands, lost. “It’s  _stolen_. You have to—”

Derek surges up, wraps arms around him, heads off the oncoming panic attack as best he can with the warmth of his body. “Forgive me,” he whispers hoarsely, sinking his claws into the back of Stiles’ neck.

Taking the memory exhausts them both. Stiles’ eyelids flutter, close, and Derek stands on unsteady legs.

“Tell him again and I rip out your spine.”

Morrell dips her chin.

* * *

Derek takes Stiles to the loft, after. He pushes him against the door, kisses him hard. Stiles kisses back, makes a confused, contented sound into it, and when Derek takes him to bed and fucks him for the first time, he goes willingly.

He won’t remember what Derek’s done to keep him there, only that Derek wants him to stay.

**Author's Note:**

> In [tumblr](http://wellhalesbells.tumblr.com/) we trust.


End file.
